Friday, March 29, 2013

Once again, I've got my good friend, Anne Michaud on my blog with an interview and a contest!

1) The
Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Give me a quick run down of what’s happening in your
writing world these days.

Well, I've been hard at work on my sequel, Girls
& Aliens, and I'm outlining the next installment, Girls & Ghosts.
There's this French novella about Hiroshima that needs editing and a screenplay
idea floating around in my brain. Oh, and did I mention my next YA novel,
Killer Girl? Yep, I'm busy all right.

2)What
kind of writer are you? Do you plot your stories out? Do you have a particular
routine? What does your writing “day” look like?

I outline everything that comes up as the story
gestates, then write accordingly.
I often stray, but then I readjust the outline, to not get stuck. My
routine is write as I wake up, eat, walk the dog, write, eat, write, read, go
to bed. My life is so glamorous, I fear people will get jealous.

3) How
long have you been writing for?

Full-time, since my Master's in screenwriting eight
years ago. It never stopped since, it comes out in short stories,
novellas, novels, scripts. It just
won't leave me alone. Seriously, is there a drug for it to stop? Help!

I used to dream of traditional publishing and agents,
but recently, I'm not so sure. I want to make a living out of this writing bug,
and from what I'm reading on the internets, it doesn't happen as much as it
used to with trad pub. I'm adjusting, I'm not locking doors, I really want to see
my work in hardback at Indigo, but if it doesn't happen, no one's gonna die.

5) Where do you think we’re going in this
crazy publishing world?

Exactly where we are: some will buy indie, some will
buy trad, some a mix of both. I refuse to believe paper books will vanish, and
I'm fed up of readers snubbing indie from bad experiences. Like everyone else,
I want to read good books, and hardbacks aren't immune to suckiness, just as
indie isn't either.

6) What
is the best way to sell books?To
get your name out there?

If I only knew. I'm guessing good reviews get word of
mouth, then some sort of blog tour to reach potential readers, and if luck is
involved, it'll work. If not, all that hard work for nothing – until the next
book comes out and it starts all over again!

7) What
are your goals for the future? Where do you want your writing to take you?

I want to learn a living from my writing, which means
after I finish my transcription contracts at 4 in the afternoon, I go to my WiP
and write until my brain bleeds. On free weekends, I write some more. I've read
over and over again how indie writers can actually reach their goals by
productively releasing more than one book in a year, so that's what I'm trying
to to.

8) If
you could get inside the head of one writer (living or dead) for an hour, who
would it be and why?

Neil Gaiman, because his
world is beautiful and frightening, and I wish so much to be part of it. Not in
a creepy fangirl way, more like a character he shapes into someone dark and
demure. Oh yes, me loves the dark.

Anne is not only a talented writer but she also makes these super cute skeletons...here's your chance to win some!

She who likes dark things never grew up.
She never stopped listening to gothic, industrial and alternative bands like
when she was fifteen. She always loved to read horror and dystopia and fantasy,
where doom and gloom drip from the pages.

She, who was supposed to make films,
decided to write short stories, novelettes and novels instead. She, who’s had
her films listed on festival programs, has been printed in a dozen anthologies
and magazines since.

She who likes dark things prefers night to
day, rain to sun, and reading to anything else.

Friday, March 15, 2013

Isn't much of a secret really. I mean, I've understood
the idea of “The Secret” for some time...think I watched a show on Oprah about
it or something. In case you haven't heard of "The Secret", it's something along the lines of visualizing one's goals to the extent that you believe it will
happen. The power of faith. Believing in yourself. Whatever.

I'm not a very spiritual person, neither is my husband.
In fact, he makes fun of me whenever I talk about astrology or “nonsense” like
that cause it’s all superstition as far as he’s concerned. We were talking one afternoon about my
writing goals and some decisions that were pending...decisions that were out of
my control. I said something negative (which is typically the way I roll when
talking about myself) and he surprised me by saying that I needed to believe in
my goals if I wanted them to happen and that speaking negatively about it went
against the principles of “The Secret”. I think my mouth actually dropped open
and I thought about checking his forehead for fever. The Secret? Really? That's
bordering on spiritual in many ways. The power of faith? Restricted territory
in our world.

He went on to say that he'd been watching a
documentary about “The Secret” and although he couldn't finish watching it
cause it got too preachy and boring (this is when I knew he was still the same
level headed man I married) he did find it intriguing that the idea of
believing in your goals could have such power. When I tried to argue about
track record he said, "you can't base what's going to happen in the future on
what has happened in the past, not when you're talking about things that are
out of your control". Hmmmmmmmm....now, that made sense to me, it really gave me
something to think about. Nothing that has happened in my past could impact the
decision that was coming, at least not luck or superstition or anything like
that..

So, that night, while reading in bed, I started
thinking about what he said. I closed the paperback I was holding and looked at
the cover. Of course it was the genre I write and it just so happened that the
author’s last name name starts with a capital A...so you know what I did? I covered
all the other letters in that author's name except for the A, and then I envisioned
myself holding my own book, tracing that embossed A over and over again. It
felt good. It felt powerful. So that’s my secret. ;-)